


Secrets

by Keenir



Series: Her ID. [1]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel (Movies)
Genre: Friends back their friends' decisions, Gen, Tony Stark ships Jen/Steve, and Loki thought he had a skeleton in the closet?, hulkbusters, past Bruce Banner/Maria Hill
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-31
Updated: 2013-09-09
Packaged: 2017-12-25 02:10:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 11,873
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/947363
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Keenir/pseuds/Keenir
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the (near) future, Captain America would like to go on a date with Agent Hill - who feels she <strike>has</strike> is a good reason to say no.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> "Who would do that?'  
> "I don't know! It would have to be someone with an obsession. Somebody with nothing to lose. Someone nobody would suspect until it was all over."  
> -FBI Agent Dylan Rhodes, Thaddeus Bradley; Now You See Me.
> 
>    
> (and yes, on one of the European maps in the recent Captain America movie, one town or city is labeled _Innsbrook_ )

He finds her up on a rooftop. "This isn't exactly healthy for either of us," Bruce says after standing there for half an hour anyway.

Maria Hill shrugs.

"You told me you got sick of these views back when you were assigned to the office in Gotham."

"I did," Maria said, thinking of the people she had met there... _Batman, the Question, Al Ghul._

"Which means something scared you up here. Not a physical threat - you're almost _me_ in durability," Bruce said. "Something that struck your thoughts, impacted your heart."

_You may not be poetic often, Bruce, but when you are, you're good._ "And you have a theory on what it is."

By way of answering, "Steve asked me a question," Bruce said.

"It happens."

"Not often, but yeah, that's true. But this time, this question was if he'd done anything wrong. He doesn't mind that you're rebuffing him - but he's curious if you're doing it because he did something to offend you without him realizing it."

"And?"

"And did he?"

"No," Maria says. "But what he wants...is not a good idea."

"Were we a good idea?" Bruce counters with his usual tone of voice.

"A better idea," she says. "There are a lot of reasons why being involved with Steve is a bad idea for me."

"You forget," Bruce says.

"I don't forget anything. You know that."

He nods. "That's how I know you remember that I've seen under your hood."

There's the temptation to snort, to smile, or to let the comment slide; normal people do that, she knows. "You've been spending too much time with the Starks." _And what lies under my hood, as you put it, is exactly what Steve will recoil from._

"Catching up," Bruce says. "So what are you going to do?"

"Go back to Gotham," Maria says, and it isn't entirely a lie - she _has_ been pursuing a line of inquiry which would result in being posted back there. "Or to one of the Innsbrooks."

Despite never having been to either Innsbrook, Bruce shudders - he's heard the name and seen a page of a file on each. "Or you could talk to Steve."

"And you could talk to Betty."

"No, I can't, not really, and that's the difference, Maria," Bruce says. "There aren't any guns that'll point at your head if you go near Steve."

"There are always things pointed at me, Bruce," Maria replies with equal calm and resignation. "SHIELD just hides theirs better." _Steve's gun will just be one more._

**~~~**

Steve walked into the warehouse, well aware that all the rows upon rows of pillars holding up the roof could easily be used for a good-sized regiment to ambush him from. "You wanted to see me?"

"I asked to see you, Captain. I left open the option for you to refuse," Maria Hill said, stepping out into view about a hundred yards or so away. _This neighborhood, like this building, has been unused for a decade. Makes it useful today._

"I was curious what you wanted to talk to me about, Agent Hill," in case she preferred that form of address.

"Dr. Banner tells me that you asked him why I turned you down when you offered to take me out for ice cream," she said.

Steve nodded.

"Why would you want to date me?"

"Stark would say I have a type - intelligent and capable, able to handle herself. And because I like your company."

"You only know the things about me which aren't classified," Maria informed him.

"Do I have the clearance to know?"

Bluntly, "No."

"Then I'm fine with that," Steve said. _I'll find out when I get clearance, or when you want to let me know._

"No, you wouldn't be."

"You sound sure of yourself."

"Because I read the histories, the ones which were invented, and the ones which should have been fictional," Maria Hill said. "There is a long history of god-kings and gods killing their predecessors. When the Olympian gods could take no more, they killed every Titan they could," Maria said. "Benevolent Titans like Prometheus, they could be more inventive with...removing his liver every day as he was chained to a rock for all eternity." _I suppose I could have brought that up with Loki when he was in our custody. I suppose I feared...not him, exactly; feared he might reveal me to the Avengers and the crew._ "The Hero Twins of Mesoamerica achieved victory over the lords of death in their own way. I could continue easily."

Steve nodded. "What does mythology have to do with us?"

"There's a word for the child of a god and a human, Steve. The same word which was used with Hercules, stands ready for use when Dr. Foster and Thor have their child, just as it stood ready for in case you and Colonel Carter had a baby."

"Can't exactly say I'm surprised SHIELD and the SSR re-used an old word instead of making one up."

Maria had abandoned eye-rolling a long time ago. "The same word the SSR and SHIELD use in my file, Captain," she said.

Steve had seen far too much in his time on Earth...pre- and post-waking up...to dismiss that out of hand. "Have...have I met your parents?"

"You defeated my father," Maria said matter-of-factly.

"Loki?" Steve asked, _hoping_ it was Loki. The alternative... _Oh God._

"There's a reason why I've been able to kill more HYDRA agents than anyone else in SHIELD." _Besides the fact that those sanctamonious bastards in HYDRA keep hoping that blood will prove thicker than water and loyalties; they keep forgetting just_ whose _blood runs in my veins._

Steve looked at her, feeling his mind re-shuffling everything he knew and thought he knew about her and SHIELD and how they tied together, shuffling like so many playing cards.

Maria stood there, perfectly stock still.

When Captain Rogers spoke again, it was to say "We're more than who our parents are."

Maria blinked. "That's it?"

"What did you expect? That I'd hold you to be as guilty as your father?"

"I've found that to be a good personal motivator." _For a start._

"You shouldn't," Steve said.

"Are you," Maria asked him, her voice taking on a deeply dangerous quality, as much challenging as slightly hypnotic, "Are you telling me that I have wasted my entire life to this point?"

"No. SHIELD is -"

"As much my creation as Peggy's. I was present as it was molded into its present form. Before anything else arose, and even with all other threats, SHIELD exists to root out every last bit of HYDRA. And when there is nothing else of the Red Skull left, I will be over."

_Damn, that's dedication. And more than a little obsessive._ "That's it?"

"I need more of a reason to work for SHIELD, Captain?"

"I didn't say that. I just... Is that all life is for you?" he asked, as much probe as curious.

Maria frowned and leaped closer to him. Not very close, but cutting the distance in at least half. "'All'? Ask Thor what life is like when you know you will see everyone grow old and die. Would you like to know what Barnes - what _Bucky_ said before he left on his final mission, Captain?"

Despite himself, Steve nodded.

"'If you see Steve, give 'im a salute for me, and tell him to keep giving them hell'," Maria quoted. "And the other members of your unit, perhaps you would care to hear their parting words? Or the other applicants for the serum, all of whom were drafted into SHIELD."

"Is there a point?"

"I do not die. I do not forget. I exist. And _I chose_ to believe that my existence serves a purpose." _Else, what would I do with the eternity which lays before me?_

"I've got no problem with that," Steve said.

"Clearly you do. You think we need a life beyond our duty, beyond the driving force that gets us out of bed at any hour of day or night to keep this planet, this universe safe. I thought as you did...once." _Twice, but the first time...it didn't end well, and at the time, I thought it was because I didn't know everything I was capable of._

"And here I thought you were just afraid to date a living legend," Steve said, offering a jest, a bit of humor.

Maria's laugh was dry, catching the irony of his original assumption with what he now knew to be the truth. "When I was young, you were my hero."

"I tried to kill your father."

"Why did you think you were my hero?" Maria asked him.

Not knowing what to say to that, or how to say anything that he might have thought of, had he thought of it, Steve let a silence fall. Minutes later, neither of them really moving from their positions, "What now?" he asked.

"That depends upon you," she said.

"What do you mean?"

"We could return to our respective corners, alluding to nothing and acting as though nothing at all happened here."

"Or?"

"Or I could go on crushing HYDRA, you could return to SHIELD, and the two of us do battle whenever our paths cross."

Steve shook his head. "Those can't be the only options."

"Those are the only viable options, Captain Rogers," said Agent Hill.

"No, there's another one."

"That we fall into one another's arms, I tumble into your bed, and we fight as lovers until the stars grow cold?" _You continue to underestimate our regenerative capability._

"Okay, two other options."

"I'm listening."


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> SHIELD Agent Maria Hill's POV on a fairly normal day, not long after the events of Chapter 1.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  _"Hannibal is at the gates!"_ -the warning passed down through generations of Romans.
> 
> "What is that?"  
> "It's me on a bad day!"  
> \--Nemo, Mr. Hyde; The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.

Everyone gets out of my way as I make my way into the basement of this SHIELD bunker. I'm still amazed Stark hasn't confronted me about this place, if only to find out when we Hulk- and Iron Man-proofed it; we never did - the uppermost and lowermost defenses of this facility date back to the fifties. Three men are needed to open each of the doors in front of me, and then to close those doors once I pass through; those are here for me: the idea was that even if I was strong enough to get through, I had to tire eventually. It was a reasonable idea at the time.

Prisoners are never sent down here unless they have proven themselves resistant to every other tactic: flattery, cajolery, bribery, seduction, torture, threats, and a dozen other means. Or unless they are me. This was the corner I would be sent to take a time-out in.

And the latest capture of HYDRA agents brought us one Daniel Tomasian, not the highest-ranking of his little cell, but the one with all the secrets. And it was decided to send him down here. I would say 'God save me from the true believers'...but I have no intent of invoking Him. Of either of Him.

By the time I reach the final door, the one which opens to my old cage and Tomasian's current prison, the walls have since given way to bare rock. If you look carefully, you can still see gouges from a few tries to dig my way out - I was five, how was I to know what 'deep subterranean' meant?

This door too closes, and now he is not alone in this room. No, now he is trapped in here with me.

"If you think you can sway me, after all your friends have failed," Tomasian says, and turns around and sees me standing here. "And now SHIELD offers me a carrot, in the hopes I'll bite? Sorry, miss, but seducing me didn't work upstairs, and it won't work in this enviroment either."

"I'm not here for that," I tell him flatly. I think me and Coulson have used warmer tones with Stark. "I'm here to make you kneel."

"The velvet glove didn't work - are you the whip?" he asks, making a very bad joke that would make even Stark shake his head in disappointment.

"I am the iron fist." I give him a tiny smile, the toothy sort which always makes mortal men back away and never understand why their instinct bade them do that. "You have heard of me."

He shakes his head, having already bumped into the stone wall.

"HYDRA has rewards for my safe return. For me under such names as Sinthea Schmidt, as Valentina de Santis, as Alice Gardener," and I see recognition appearing in those eyes of his. He knows the names, and he's no doubt thinking of how the upper echelons of HYDRA will reward him for delivering me to them. Of course, he no doubt suspects, that is assuming that I am indeed who I say I am - some prisoners down here, they outright challenge me on that, others ask politely.

As I walk towards him, slowly, steadily, keeping both eyes fixed on him, "You cannot be her," Tomasian asserts, only half certain of what he is saying.

I stop when I am half an arm's-length away from him. "This is where you surrender," I inform him.

"Why should I surrender to a liar?"

Sometimes I only need do this once a year. Sometimes, rarely thrice in a month. But to reach my goal, I have long since come to accept that I must do that which I hate. I can feel the hormones flowing, a shift in my dermal chemistry. My scalp rolls back to the ponytail I used to have and always hated. All the cartilage of my nose turns into the core, the grounding for the blade that is the skin of my nose.

I shut my eyes, tightly, and it isn't so Tomasian thinks its for dramatic effect or to scare him - those are bonuses, and have been every damn time - and work - fight - wrestle to keep the change restricted to my head and, in a lesser extent, my hands as they lengthen and more fully wrap around his throat and neck. Opening my eyes, I can see all the secrets Tomasian thinks he keeps from his fellow men: his two affairs, his year of sobriety, an allergy to morphine and a fear of the starkness of hospitals. More finely developed than those of mortal women and men, my senses are still dulled when I'm not like this - and I've no doubt my father and Captain Rogers have senses well beyond my own.

My eyes open, I know Tomasian can see the fire which burns in my pupils.

Now he can see a little of what lies below my hood.

His throat goes dry, skin paled, and hands will have gone clammy. Predictable. Boring. "You are...You _are_ His Daughter," Tomasian says in a small reverent voice. "Forgive me."

"Forgiveness must be earned," I say, and it is so very rote.

His eyes never flicker to the door and the SHIELD personnel waiting on the other side - some HYDRA agents let their eyes leave mine, others don't; I appreciate the variety - and I can guess what he's thinking: what better place for The Red Skull's daughter, than commanding the agents of SHIELD? Not one army ready for His return, but two armed groups, their edges kept sharp by constant use against one another. "Of course. My life is yours to take as you see fit."

"Answer the questions which SHIELD has put to you, and I may be merciful. Provide additional information, and I may prove benevolent," and I let go of his throat, gravity dropping him to the floor in a puddle of subservience.

"I shall tell you everything," Tomasian says.

They never notice the word 'may'.

**~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~**

"You asked to see me?" Director Fury asks me once I'm allowed into his office.

My hairline's back where I prefer it, and everything else is back to the way I keep looking when I'm on duty and when I'm off-duty. I look every bit a normal human. The appearance I opt to live, the 'fashion' I cultivate, hair and nails and lips and all those details.

"I did," I say. 

"You did good work with Tomasian," Fury says. Only a sitting Director and his closest aides ever get to see my other face and live; that means Fury and Coulson.

"And you aren't letting me go after the base he informed us of."

"And you know why."

"My father," I say. I have this conversation at least once with every Director that sits in this office. A minor miracle it took this long into your administration. No doubt it helps that I was in Gotham for most of it, until you brought together the Avengers.

"Personally, Hill, I don't give a shit who your dad was," though you say that while knowing perfectly well who he was. "Nerves are tense enough for agents going into these sort of situations. We don't need to douse the situation with nitro."

"You think I'll turn red, or worse, turn HYDRA ?" I ask of him, and only decades of experience in exactly this sort of situation, keeps me from slamming my palms into his desk and letting that demonstrate his point for him.

"I don't think anything of the sort," Fury informs me, his voice just as calm as mine, the sort of patient tone that drives Stark up the wall. "But unlike my predecessors, I don't plan on running SHIELD like an arm of the SSR. That means I'd refuse Captain Rogers the mission for the same reason I'm refusing you."

"No going for reasons of revenge?"

"Revenge is fine. I prefer to save my aces for the big games, not throw them into every pot."

"In other words," I add neutrally, "save the superheroes for fighting off the lions and tigers and bears, not every feral cat that eats a baby."

"Was there anything else you wanted to discuss, Agent Hill?" Fury asks me.

"No, sir," I say. At least you have a better reason, Director. "Well...one thing, Director."

"And that is?"

"May I inquire as to the progress being made on the latest iteration of Hulkbusters?"

"On that front, you know everything I do."

 _And that includes the Why of their existence...beyond Bruce._ "I see."

"And you find that satisfactory?"

"Far from it, sir," I answer.

"Then fix that problem while the others are out," Fury advises. "Sooner rather than later," which is his way of dismissing me.

**~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~**

The quinjet drops me off at my other facility, where Colonel Carol Danvers is waiting for me. "Everything good, Agent Hill?"

"Nothing's gone wrong," I answer, which is as close as I can plausibly say for today. "Yourself?"

"Given that this is SHIELD, I just have to say that if this is a normal post, I'd like to request a transfer back to Antarctica," Danvers says.

"At the end of the month. You still have a conference to attend with Rhodes."

"How do - how did you find out?"

"Your name is on the guest list," I say. "And Stark made certain you would have the largest table."

"I'll kill him."

"There's a line," I say. "You _want_ to go back to the land of radial fossils?"

"So long as Loki isn't there," Danvers says. "I know we need him on this, but I think he's going stir-crazy, and he's trying to take us with him."

"Next time, inform him that you and Jenn are stronger than Dr. Banner's friend - Loki's met him."

"Except I'm not."

"You know the story of the child in the road during wartime," I ask her.

Danvers nods. "You're hiding by the side of the road, waiting for the enemy to come down the road into your ambush. Then you see a child playing in the road. Either you do nothing, and the kid dies; or you save the kid, but that alerts the enemy and your unit dies."

I nod. "That isn't just why we need Loki. That's why we're all here." One god, two demigods, and a savant.

Danvers used to be a pilot, as did Jenn; Carol got to go back to being a pilot, Walters didn't...not afterwards. Worst game of rock-paper-scissors ever...no, yet. That's all that decided which of them would sit where in the craft, which was brought down so devastatingly that one was near-death and the other received intensive surgery for the next two days. It could easily have gone the other way - with Danvers, not Walters, who received the transfusion from Bruce.

I pinch the bridge of my nose lightly. Affectation or not, it feels suited here. I sense that, as important as that is for Danvers, she's using it to cover another question. "Is there a problem?" I inquire. I don't like problems; to be fair, they rarely last long around me.

Danvers nods. "I feel a little bad, working on this with you and Jen. I mean, this thing, can't be anything other than a Hulkbuster...right?"

"Jen knows what it is," I assure her.

"And she's fine with it?" Danvers asks me, clearly incredulous.

"She knows there are things out there which are bigger and tougher than Hulks," I say, and palm the security screen to admit the two of us to inside the facility. As much as I would regret the deaths of Jen and Bruce, I would certainly mourn, I also know where I stand on things; they may be in my unit and fighting alongside me, but they're also the child - and I know exactly how strong they are, and I know we need something far stronger if we're going to win.

I used to wonder, how much of that attitude is pragmatics, and how much is inherited from my father. And is there anywhere else that I might have gotten that from?

Carol chews on that fact the entire trip down to the research floors; no doubt she suspected as much before - probably even before the New York Incursion gave one example of a bigger-than-Hulk creatures.

"Welcome back," Jen tells us when the door to the research floor opens. I toss her the thermos of coffee, and she says thanks.

"We were beginning to question, Trialsdaughter," Loki tells me.

"Good," I tell him; it's possible somebody told him about Dr. Erskine's tests. It's also possible he figured it out for himself. Or that he met my dad at some point. "Did it stop you from holding up your end of the bargain?" Project Paperclip gets a new lease on life, but only in his particular case.

"It did not."

"Good. Show me."


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> At the latest Hulkbuster test, Steve attacks Maria.
> 
> And a little of what motivates Jen to work on Hulkbusters.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> How far in the future? After Tony and Pepper get married; beyond that, not sure. But that's what is meant by "Time: Now" below.

**Time: Now**

"I don't get it."

"What now, Tony?" Rhodes asked, not taking his eyes off the view through the - _what is this? looks like Lexan, but it'd have to be lots tougher. Above my pay grade, that's for certain._ \- at the weathered and mottling discoloration of the crater-in-a-crater valley before them.

"A certain young lady who shall remain nameless -"

Jen snorted.

"- got all in my face about my making Hulkbusters not terribly long ago. Almost turned me into a tinned meal. And now we find out she's been making her own Hulkbusters?" Tony Stark said.

"Maybe she prefers a personal touch," Rhodes suggested, mostly not serious about it; but when Tony was talking to you, being quiet was the worst thing to do. General Ross wasn't the only member of the US military whose backers in the Pentagon and Joint Chiefs wanted Rhodes present to witness this test of the latest Hulkbusters; Ross was just the name that came to Banner's and Walter's minds on the subject.

"Hey, I am all about the personal touch."

"Only if you want Pepper to be the one to tin you."

"It is personal," Jen said. "My cousin trusts you."

"Says the woman – said cousin, in fact - who is showing off her latest innovation in anti-Hulk weaponry," Tony said.

"Can we please just...watch what we were asked to watch," Steve asked the three of them.

"Fine. But never let it be said I never asked."

"Nobody could ever say that of you," Rhodes commented.

Jen smiled.

“Unless they’ve never heard of you,” Steve said to Tony.

“I should make a joke at this point about having spent half a century in a private Fortress Of Solitude with the A.C. working overtime. But then again, we barely need one hand to count those people,” Stark replied.

“Never tried that,” Jen said. _Bruce mentioned once that he went for a long walk in the snow – but then he tried to shoot himself, and if anything gives new encouragement to his Buddy to keep hanging around, that’d be a good choice._

“It isn’t fun,” Steve said.

_Next time I’m in Antarctica, maybe I’ll go for a long jog, see if I can find a place to make my future Fortress Of Solitude._

“Speaking barrels of fun,” Tony said to Rhodes, “we should go see what Colonel Danvers and Agent Hill are up to – they might even have cookies.”

“That’s the Dark Side,” Rhodes said.

“Girl Scouts, but that’s splitting hairs, maybe. C’mon, the timer will go off when the Hulkbuster’s ready to fire. And in the meantime, I’ve got some ideas I want to run by them.”

_Don’t mind me,_ Jen thought.

Once Rhodes agreed to Tony’s wheedling, and joined him in going to the lower floor of this observation post, _Okay, now they can get some alone time,_ Tony thought. _In my considerable experience, it isn't a rebound if there was never even a date; it's just wistfulness and wishful thinking - that and a subway pass will get you on a subway._

"Did they just...?" Steve asked.

"Bricks are more subtle," Jen said.

"You mean a brick wall, right? Because that's true."

"You've never juggled bricks?" Jen jested.

"Somehow it never came up," Steve said.

"We'll fix that," she promised.

“I know _I’d_ be nervous if someone asked me to make something that can kill me,” Steve said. _Wonder if that’s part of the reason I never felt comfortable with other people handling my vibranium shield._

“I don’t think of it like that,” Jen said. “Question I ask myself is this – do I want to make the bullet with my name on it, or do I want to live with myself after I level a not-so-small country?” her voice leaving implicit the ‘and knowing it could happen again and again.’

“I have to admit, I never thought about it like that.”

“Most people don’t need to,” she observed.

"One question comes to mind," Steve said, taking a tenative step towards the window, stopping well short of it. "Not about the bricks, though. Kinda sorta about the bullet."

"Shoot."

"Maybe I'm missing something here, but, well, don't take this the wrong way, but...how do you test a Hulk-Buster...?"

"Without actually putting a Hulk out there?" Jen asked, liking how he was actively trying to avoid implying a cold-hearted nature (putting one of her own kind out there) and also to avoid implying short-sightedness (forgetting a test subject for the test).

Steve nodded.

"Dogs. Used to be dogs, anyway. No idea what Agent Hill uses these days. Anyway, not all of the dogs who were turned into Hulks in the early days, were set loose on my cousin when he was new to being big and green."

"I suppose that makes sense," Steve said.

Jen nodded. “In my opinion, it’s a sight safer than relying on the Erskine Paradox.”

“I don’t remember reading about any paradoxes he discovered,” Steve said. _And I had lots of time to read over his work, pre-freezing._

“Named in honor of him. ‘After his important tests on the serum’ as Agent Hill told me once. And man, you don’t hear sarcasm like that from her or anybody else most days. Or I don’t.”

"I don't get it," Steve says. "What is it about Dr. Erskine's tests that -?"

“There weren't any," Jen says. 

“What?”

“There weren’t any.”

“There had to have been some,” Steve said. _Why would…why would he inject himself with an untested serum, even if he became the Red Skull as a result?_

"The Red Skull was the closest thing to a test run which was performed, and you, Captain America, were the finished product.”

"And Dr. Banner was the re-try," summing up what he had gathered from Agent Coulson's briefings and listening to his fellow Avengers.

Jen smiled. _Nice. And thanks, for putting it so nicely. That means a lot._ "Yeah. But no, he didn't fail," she says, just as the timer goes off. "Let's see what we've got, shall we?" as they could hear footfalls coming up the stairs.

"Don't your suits have a tiptoe option, Tony?" Steve asked. "Or an ambush mode?"

_I try playing cupid, and this is the thanks I get. Honestly,_ Tony thought. "Wrong suit version for that," Tony said.

Following everyone else up to the observation post, Agent Hill said, “And, firing,” and pressed the button.

The missile fired in almost perfect silence, which itself was an improvement in the minds of several of the observers. Then it struck the center of the innermost crater, and rippled outward in a hemisphere which atomized the missile itself, while radiating outwards was what looked like a pressure wave – one which didn’t compress or destroy anything it touched. But as it passed through the observers…

Jen doubled over, her legs gone wobbly, one hand nearly tearing the solid panel off in a grip for dear life.

Steve collapsed to the floor, and couldn’t get himself any higher than on his hands and knees. He struggled to raise his head against the throbbing pain in his skull and the pulsating sores up and down his spine... and he saw Maria struggling - _And she’s changing color_ \- as she struggled with the same difficulties he was, only hers were compounded.

His balance was restoring itself quicker than his hearing was, so there was a sense of unreality and haze to what he was hearing.

Yet she managed to notice him looking at her, and a too-toothy smile flashed on her face. "Did you doubt my words, Captain?" Agent Hill asked before curling up into the fetal position.

"Tony?" Rhodes asked.

"I'm as much in the dark as you are, buddy," Stark said.

Jen braced herself against a wall and let it be a crutch until she could balance on her own two feet again - thirty seconds later. "Well, that sucked. Dull pain behind the eyes, near-total loss of balance, and a few shooting pains in my back; but nothing that would take me out of a fight for very long."

_Sometimes a fight or a battle can be won with that sort of a window of opportunity,_ Rhodes knew, and knew to not say so.

"Captain Rogers? Agent Hill?" Jen asked, watching the both of them get a healthy flesh-tone to their skins. _Hill turned skullish and red, while Rogers looked more like he was running a fever and not too much like death warmed over._

With the exception of his still-glazed-over eyes, Steve recovered first, and he looked at Maria, leaping at her and pinning her down and making a fist that he pulled back and -

Jen grabbed that wrist and yanked him off Agent Hill, handing him over to Stark and Rhodes.

"Instinct, Captain, or reflex?" Maria asked him as she was helped to her feet.

His vision clearing back to normal, Steve shrugged off the grips of his friends, and walked out of the building. _I thought I saw... Thought I saw Him. Thought I had a chance to finish our fight, to get back at Him for everything that's happened to me since the Tesseract took Him away and left me frozen for decades._ But didn't trust his voice.

Maria went back downstairs to work on the equipment.

Rhodes and Stark and Walters looked at one another, and weren't entirely sure what to say, other than 'lets not let that happen again' which was an unspoken agreement now. Finally, "Uh, guys?" Tony asked.

"Yeah?" Rhodes asked.

"If I ever - and I don't care if I'm joking or serious or whatnot - _ever_ say that somebody's jumping someone else's bones...you have my complete and unvarnished permission to throw me through a wall."

"Same here," Jen said.

"I'm glad I don't use remarks like that," Rhodes said. "Or I'd have to ask for the same too."

**~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~**  
 **FLASHBACK:**

Jennifer Walters entered the room where Agent Hill had commandeered upon her arrival this morning from overseas. “You asked to see me?” Jen asked.

"A sweater, Agent Walters?" asked Agent Hill. “In Antarctica?”

"You have any idea how hard it is finding polar-weather clothes in my size?" Jen asked in answer. _Also, I’m not terribly cold, even outside. Still, this is my favorite sweater._ "Also, I’m a consultant. You were clear on that when you recruited me and Danvers in that hospital.”

"I was. Finding anything of interest?"

"What, you don't read the reports?"

"No matter how much we impress the importance upon them," Maria said, "not every agent jots down every relevant fact. And even those who do, don't write things down immediately." _Can't always do that when pinned down in a situation, granted._

"Then no," Jen said. "There's just more of the empty rocks being dug up and put into storage. No new fossils or anything weird happening."

"I see. And would either of you care for a transfer?"

_You sound disappointed that nothing weird is coming out of the rocks._ "Where to?"

"Somewhere warmer," Agent Hill said. _Southern Canadian ice sheets._

"I don't care to, no thanks," Jen said; "you'd have to ask Danvers yourself if she wants to.”

"There is another option."

"No," Jen said flatly and without delay or hesitation.

"Few people alive know more about Hulkbusters than you do, Captain Walters."

Dryly, Jen said, "There's _a reason_ for that, Agent Hill."

"You're afraid of it," Hill observed.

"I don't expect you to know what that's like."

"On the contrary. I know what it is to know my terrors on sight and by name. I know how long it took me to learn to face my fears, then to face them down. So yes, yes I fear," Maria said.

"Since when?" Jen asked.

"Since always. The more so, since I learned what I was capable of."

"You're afraid of what you can do? Join the club."

"Founding member, actually. And I am not just afraid of what I will do. Also which side I'll be using it against."

Jen looked at her very carefully. "So the Hulkbuster Projects are actually...youbusters."

"That's a very good description of the endgame where their development is supposed to be heading," Maria said.

"Speaking of endgames, I took a gander at the video files you loaned me," Jen said. "I know it wasn't why you sent it to me, but I kinda like Captain Rogers."

"That was the other reason why I sent it to you."

"Do tell."

"We think we narrowed down the location of his crash." _Granted, we thought we found it before, or had it narrowed down to a city block's radius; and it never panned out._

"So what do you want me to do?" Jen asked.

"Be there when he wakes up," Maria said.

Jen blinked. "You want his introduction to the modern age, to be my green mug?"

"You are the calmest person I know."

"You need to get out more."

"Director Fury has left it up to his two Second In Commands to decide how the Captain is woken up. The alternative, which Agent Coulson feels is best, that the Captain should be eased into things, transitioned carefully and calmly."

"Nothing wrong with calm."

"Steve Rogers is a man who was well accustomed to being dropped in the deep end of things, long before Dr. Erskine got ahold of him," Maria said.

"There it is again."

"What?"

"Almost every time you mention the guy's name, you look like you want to rip somebody's head off and drop a hungry weasel down the pipes. What'd this Erskine guy do to you?"

"Abraham Erskine made me possible," Maria said. _Without him, my father would have been just another Nazi officer with dreams of tapping into foreign belief systems and occult powers; and HYDRA, if it existed, would have been a flash in the pan._ Maria let her nostrils flare, the skin there and around it turning, for a few seconds, a distinctly unblushing red. Jen’s eyebrows nearly went into her bangs. "The Hulkbusters are one of several projects I chair, _to undo_ Dr. Erskine's work."

"SHIELD doesn't object to that plan?" Jen asked.

"Fait accompli. And with the victories which will be a part of that plan, there won't be much if any room for complaint."

"Everyone loves a winner," Jen quipped.

"Most do."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tony's comment about Jen and Hulkbusters (Hulk & the Agents of S.M.A.S.H. episode 1.02) would have been jossed if not for her explanation.


	4. Fear herself

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rhodes chats with the inventor of the first Hulkbusters.
> 
> Reconciling the Erskine Paradox with "Surely he could not succeed. Again."
> 
> And a bit of Agent Hill's childhood.

**NOW**

Rhodes was going over the numbers and materials for the latest tested Hulkbuster with Jen and Carol, when Jen remarked “Huh.”

“Good huh or bad huh?” Rhodes asked.

“There’s a good one?” Carol Danvers asked.

“That’s what I was told. So far, I’ve only used the ‘that’s bad’ huh, and the ‘not so bad’ huh.” Then he asked Jen, “And this one would be…”

“Neither,” Jen said. “Mine was the ‘that doesn’t belong there, and I didn’t put it there’ huh.”

The other two looked at the part of the formulae mathematical and otherwise which she was pointing to, but shook their heads.

“Okay, for those of us who didn’t get their brains scrambled,” Jen said good-naturedly, “that number should be switched with _this_ one in the next line. Otherwise it allows _way_ too much retraction.”

“Retraction?”

“When the big green curls up in the white stick figure, basically. Or vice versa, if anybody’s dumb enough to fire a Hulkbuster at my cousin when he’s on the small side. The retracted side gets a chance to wait it out and lick their wounds, while the exposed side has to deal with the outside world.”

“Much as I hate to argue with an expert,” Rhodes said, “but I was under the impression that…”

“Hulks,” Jen said.

“…that Hulks heal any and all wounds less than a minute after being injured.”

“You’re not wrong. Pretty much everything qualifies under that header. But Hulkbusters don’t. Neither would a 747 heading straight down from the upper atmosphere.”

_Wild guess – Thor’s hammer counts in that rarified company._

“And did you mean that?” Jen asked him.

“Personally, I’d rather not say ‘Hulks.’”

“And thankya kindly for that. But that isn’t what I was asking about. You really think I’m an expert?”

“I’ve known Tony long enough to know that he doesn’t go around accusing people of expertise unless they genuinely have it,” Rhodes said.

“Question is,” Danvers said, interrupting what in her opinion may or may not have been a moment, “do we think he knows they’re her baby?”

“Stark?” Jen asked. “No way.”

“You invented the Hulkbuster?” Rhodes asked Jen.

Carol nodded. “She did.”

Thinking over what he knew of the project’s development, from the first test to the most recent, “The timeline doesn’t add up,” Rhodes said; _because even Tony would know better than to unleash an untested idea onto a test range without at least a day in R &D._

“That’s because you’re keeping the name,” Jen said. _And maybe assuming I needed to know what a Hulk was, before I could start thinking about ways to destroy one._ Using a small pun, “Before I looked a little chlorophilly, I didn’t call them Hulkbusters – it was more an intellectual exercise I played around with in high school and college. How small a blast zone could I get – how focused could the impact be - while maximizing force and so on.

“I got some scholarship offers from the Starks – for other work I did – on the condition that I work for SI when I graduated. I took the opportunity presented. But I wanted to serve my country, so I wrote a letter saying so and sent it in, and never really figured it would get past some junior under-secretary. But my request was approved and Mr. Stane said to take as much time as I needed.” Jen made a face. “By the time I came back up for air and some hint of a normal life, Mr. Stane was gone, and I didn’t think it was a good time to ask about a job.”

“You would’ve gotten one,” Rhodes assured her.

“From Stark?”

Rhodes nodded.

“I wasn’t this statuesque before the crash,” Jen quipped.

“Liar,” Danvers said.

“Everybody who hit on me, hit on you,” Jen reminded her.

“Not mutually incompatible.”

“Even before he turned his life around and became Iron Man, Tony still appreciated smart people,” Rhodes said. “If he hadn’t been able to do that much, I would have put in for a transfer long ago. He knew what he could do, and he knew what he needed other people for – at least in theory.” Then Rhodes said, “And even if, by some strange happenstance, you got turned down at SI, I’d find work for you.”

“Thanks,” Jen said.

“Ditto,” Danvers told him.

**~~~~~~~**

Ultimately, it took a week for Tony to find Agent Hill, and that was with Jarvis’ eyes everywhere. _Not calling friends or family, not checking in at work…Where are you?_ he wondered from time to time during that week.

“Hey there,” Tony said, finding her in a shallow snowless valley. When she said nothing, Tony said “Been wondering. When we were aboard Fury’s flying boat, why didn’t you say you knew me? I wouldn’t’ve been mad – would Fury?”

“No reason to acknowledge you,” Agent Hill said. “I was busy working.”

“All work and no play –“

“You played enough for both of us, Mr. Stark.”

“Somebody has to.”

“And while you’re out playing, people like Fury, like me, like Danvers and Walters and Rhodes and so many scores of others – we’re out working and fighting.”

“…so people like me can live the high life. You think I haven’t heard that before?” Stark asked.

“Then act like it.” A wry twist of her lips, and Maria Hill said, “And oh, it gets better, Mr. Stark. Remember your friend in Tennessee? The one you left hanging?”

“Ellen Brandt. Let me guess, she works for you?” Stark asked.

“No. But she was on a joint mission with Danvers and Walters when the three of them were shot down; and that’s not something SHIELD does lightly with the US military, given their hostility to us since we went our own way.” _Senator Brandt didn’t make things easier, either._

“Sounds like I’m not the only one who needs to talk to a shrink.”

 _Ah yes, and at last we get to_ that. “Do you know _why_ nobody from SHIELD or your fellow Avengers came to help you when you were dealing with Killian?” Agent Hill asked him.

“Issues over jurisdiction?”

“Nope.”

“Then I’m all ears.”

“And no mouth.”

“And I must scream. Yeah, I read that story. Not seeing how it ties in,” Tony said.

“The limits of SHIELD’s jurisdiction can be overridden if and when a member – say, an Avenger – requests reinforcements. You never asked for help, so none was given.”

“So it’s my fault.”

“If you want to call it that,” Agent Hill said.

“So what’s out here?” Tony asked.

“SHIELD gave it a file number and cartographic coordinates. I gave it a name.”

“’Mr. Classified’ would be my guess.”

“ _Cryptosapiens lakii_ , after one of the classics.”

“In what universe is The Mountains Of Madness a classic?” Stark asked.

_In this universe, where horrors are real._

“Or is it more true than we know?”

“Lovecraft wrote fiction, Stark,” Hill said. “What’s under these snows and rocks, is something with ties to the Nine Realms,” _and possibly to Nidhogg himself._

“Have you tried asking Thor?” Tony asked.

“Above his clearance level.” _Unless Odin’s treasure room is now Thor’s._

“Riight. So, when I was flying around, trying to find you, was it signifigant that I found a clue on that abandoned boat in the Ross Sea?” Iron Man asked her.

“Not particularly, no,” Agent Hill answered him. “Certainly not as meaningful as it might have been.”

“Still carrying a torch?”

“Do you need a flashlight?”

“Not what I meant.”

“I know.”

“So what are you?” Stark asked.

Hill smiled, lips curling without showing teeth. “A week. A week of you not being able to find anything? Pardon my disbelief, Stark, but I know you better than that.”

“Fury’s being his usual cryptic self, while the rest of SHIELD is either cowed or as in the dark as I am. Jarvis keeps freezing up from something you did to him – yeah, I know the authorization says ‘Howard Stark’ but I know my dad couldn’t password-protect something to save his life.”

 _And yet he helped found SHIELD, a fact you surely have learned by now._ “He was quite good at using his words to save people.”

“Really? So he wasn’t just some rich tech genius to you people?” Tony asked.

“In Vienna, he and I were surrounded by HYDRA agents. Your father talked to them for five hours until the SSR found us. When you return to your Tower, Stark, tell Jarvis ‘Fay Ray cleaves Innsbrook.’”

Within his suit, Tony winked, which was the cue for his suit’s Jarvis to use that password. As successive screens of medical reports and sniper photographs went by onscreen, Tony asked her “And what of Captain America? Nobody’s seem him since you turned a little…chartrouse?”

“He may never have fled from a bully, but that never means Steve Rogers has been unable to hide,” Maria said.

 _Now personally I think he’d be better off in a relationship with Bruce’s cousin – certainly it’d be healthier for him - but I’ll back him up any day of the week._ “The guy has feelings for you. Or do you hand in your heart when you join, _Agent?_ ”

“My heart is a very shocking organ, Iron Man. And by now, the files should be showing you images of my father. The founder of HYDRA. The enemy of Captain America. What did you think was passing through Captain Roger’s mind when he attacked me last week?”

“Exhibitionism,” Tony lied.

“You’re like a Hulk,” Maria told him flatly. “You were, even before Afghanistan gave you a physical shell to put between yourself and the world; back then, you let outrageousness and shock values be your shield, and you still do, to an extent.”

“Not sure who is supposed to be insulted by that – me or Dr. Banner.”

“Who do you think I am?” she asked.

“Agent Maria Hill of SHIELD. Colleague of Agent Phil Coulson. Works under Director Nick Fury.”

“So says my file.”

“And what say you?” Tony asked.

“I am the shield. I am the shell.”

“And you’re giving me grief for having one?”

“No. Giving you grief –“ and snorted at that, “- for refusing to face it. I know exactly who and what my shell is, just as I know who and what the rest of me is.”

“And what would that be?”

“Slated for extinction.”

“Being a little hasty here, aren’t we?” Stark asked.

“Not particularly.”

Looking her dead in the eyes, Tony recognized the look on her face. Not from firsthand seeing it on anyone… but from Pepper describing to him the look on his own face _when I told her that there’s no more openings, no more galas and whatnot, that there’s only the next mission; and again when I challenged her for standing by me when I was selling death to anybody with a checkbook, then leaving me high and dry when I was trying to do the right thing._ “You don’t mind dying in the line of duty, I take it?” he asked casually.

“I never have,” Maria said.

“Well, at least this isn’t a sudden change of behavior for you, then.”

 _Only in leaving living witnesses to my face._ “Numbers-wise, it’s very easy to go extinct with a population in the single digits.”

“Numbers aren’t everything,” Tony said.

“Unfortunately. Not with access to extermination, nor tactical moves; no rational way to know how many superheroes we need to take down my father – you should be reading his file by now.”

Tony nodded.

 _No rational way to know – so I have guessed._ “Had my father been slain by Captain America, perhaps I would have done something else with my life – if I had a life,” Maria said. “SHIELD would have become something different, without the threat of his return hanging over us.” Knowing the effect the next line would have on him, “And your father could have spent more time with you, Stark.”

**~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~**  
 **AGE: THREE & 2/3**

Margaret “Peggy” Carter sat down on the little wooden chair which had been set here for guests, and she looked at the figure who – in most places of the Western World these days – could have been trying to pass as a Halloween ghost. “Maria?” Peggy asked, speaking to the little girl under the blanket. 

“I’m not here.”

Having learned that Maria seemed to draw some level of comfort from being addressed with a tone one normally reserved for recalcitrant cadets in uniform, Peggy asked, “Then who told me that?”

Silence.

“Is that so?”

“I said it,” Maria admitted.

“Do you want to come out from under there?” Carter asked.

“No,” Maria refused.

“Can I join you under there?”

“No,” though not as forceful or stubbornly said. “I’m too scary.”

Knowing better than to say something like ‘you are not scary’ - _because there are always people who get scared_ \- Peggy said, “I don’t find you to be scary.”

“Why not?” she asked Peggy as though the older woman’s view was the aberrant one.

“Because I know you aren’t scary. You’re a little girl,” but knew better than to add ‘nothing more, nothing less’ to that.

“Do other little girls look like me?” Maria asked.

“Every little girl is unique,” Peggy said.

Maria was silent for a while, mulling on that, rolling it over in her mind.

“What’s my name?” Maria asked.

“Maria Schmidt Hill,” Peggy said, giving nearly the full name given to the baby by Maria’s mother, omitting one of the middle names, the one that was almost a classical epithet - _‘Daughter Of God’ - given with the full awareness of the level of heresy built into that name._ “Would you like me to read to you?”

“Please?” Maria asked, one reddish-pink hand starting to lift up the blanket.

“What should we read?”

“Your file.”

Peggy gave a small smile. _All the books in all the languages we’ve been able to gather from across Europe… and she prefers us reading her our files. Oh well, at least we don’t have to worry about a mental link or anything making her a security hazard in that regard,_ and tried not to think about how that security-related claim had been disproven. “Come here,” she told Maria. “Once, in the Midlands, there was a little girl named Peg Carter…”

As she told her story, she saw and felt Maria come over to alongside her, leaning against one arm.

 _If there’s one thing Parliament and Congress – or rather the high-security-access subsets of each – can agree upon, it’s that your existence is very problematic, Maria Schmidt Hill._ And hoped Stark was having some measure of luck in dealing with those people.

**~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~**  
 **AGE: FIVE & 5/7**

Howard found her in her room - it wasn't a difficult assumption to deduce, given that the hinges had ended up down the hall - where she had thrown a blanket over herself. Knocking on the doorframe, he said, "Maria?" _I’d almost gotten to the plane to go home, spend some time with my wife – and then Watson comes over and tells me about this latest explosion._

"GO AWAY!" she shouted.

"I'm coming inside, Maria. I'm sitting down on the guest chair. I just want to talk."

"Don't wanna talk. Want you to leave."

"Me?" Howard asked.

"All you. Army. Reserve. Doctors."

"And Agent Carter?" knowing that to be an ace in the hole.

Maria was quiet, pointedly not answering what would tear a hole in her argument.

"Can you tell me what happened?" _Did somebody get you mad again? If they did, then thanks for at least not killing this one._

"No."

 _O-kay, I'll let Peggy get the answer out of her when Agent Carter gets back. Meantime..._ "How should we handle this?" Howard asked Maria.

"You want my advice?" Maria asked, tenatively.

"I do. Somebody wronged you, and in my book, that means you get a say in what happens next."

"He dies."

Howard blinked. _Maybe I should start reading those psych reports after all._ But he had a better idea: "And then?"

Maria thought a moment. "I break his arms. Twist twist, like I heard him say the other day."

 _God, how many times do I have to warn those idiots not to use idioms and figures of speech in her earshot? Then again, they might been outside anyone else's earshot, and figured they were okay._ "And then what?"

"More?" she asked, confused.

He nodded, despite the fact that there was a blanket and half a room between them. "There's always something after anything we do," Howard said.

"Like the three laws of motion?"

 _It’s anyone’s guess when that brain of hers will be ready to pick up nuclear physics – she’s right at the edge of some of the principles already._ "Exactly. Same principle, anyway."

"I can't just _do_ something," Maria said, coming to understand.

"None of us can."

"Not even you?"

 _Easy on how much disbelief you're loading those three words with,_ Howard thought with a touch of amusement. "Not even me."

"Can Agent Carter?" with what sounded to Howard more like hope.

"Not as much as she might like."

Maria makes a noise that Stark figures to be bitter disappointment... _or hunger. Has the kid eaten today? She stormed out of the mess and made her way up here._

"Then what are we going to do?" Maria asks, a normal-for-her sniffle sound reaching Howard's ears.

Grinning a grin which would be little changed when his own kid was his age, Stark said "We're going to get the little troublemaker in trouble."

"Really?" she asked, an unholy level of excitement in her voice.

Stark didn't need to look at the remains of this room's door to know better answers were needed if civilization was going to survive this girl's fourth birthday and beyond. _Hopefully my 'and then what?' will at least buy time, if not provide some guidance for her developing brain._

**~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~**  
 **AGE: SIX**

" _How_ did you talk me into this?" Agent Carter asks.

"He invoked me," Maria said, sitting between them and devoting much of her energy on emptying their bags of popcorn. Her surgical mask had been lowered to facilitate eating, but her gloves were still on, as was the disguise she had on the rest of her face. Sunglasses still perched on her nose; but those were a constant feature these past few years.

 _Steve would get a good laugh out of how easy folks think me and Carter are a pair of paranoid parents – or he’d go slack-jawed and gibber. Nah, if Steve were here, he’d be the one going to the movies with Carter. Probably’ve proposed to her by now. Which would leave me watching the kid._ "I figured it was a pretty good birthday present," Bucky said. "How do you like it so far?" he asked Maria.

"Empty," she said, holding two bags out for his perusal.

Peggy smiled, _You did walk right into that one._

"I'll go get more," Bucky said. "But can you wait until the movie starts before you empty the next ones?"

Maria nodded solemnly. "I will. Promise."

"Then you've got a deal. Anything for you?" he asked Peggy.

"Nothing, thank you," Peggy said. "I will hold some extra bags, however."

Bucky nodded and headed back to the popcorn sellers up front. _I figured with as often as Maria's asked me to tell her stories about Captain America and other wartime stuff, and I always open and end each story with lines like 'and then the lights came back on', this would be a great idea. Now she can see what it's actually like. And I know the docs keep saying she's got a body-repair system_ not entirely _dissimilar from Steve's...but still, in case she doesn't live past seven or something - we knew kids like that, back in Brooklyn. And overseas._

**~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~**  
 **AGE: SEVEN & 1/2**

Corp. Lisbon gave their badges a cursory glance – he knew them both on sight, but rules were rules – before opening the door and letting them in; Lisbon waited outside, continuing to keep watch.

Maria stepped into the room, and saw all the sheathes and files and folders and bloated boxes and… Some were full of things written in English, others in German, and a few – mostly reports – in Japanese and Russian and French. Seeing one name written over and over on nearly everything, she looked around the room, taking in everything with wide eyes that then looked at Howard Stark. “Is this…?”

Knowing how rarely the girl let any sentence just hang, Stark nodded. “These are all of Dr. Erskine’s notes and papers. Even his idle jottings, just in case.”

“They’re mine now?”

“No. The Director feels you’ve been behaving, and would like you to take a look through everything here.”

She didn’t move as fast as Stark had thought she would…then it occurred to him: _She has no idea where to begin. Erskine’s desk, or his files, or… Yeah, I can imagine what’s going through that superbrain of yours right now, kid._

As she sat and read, Maria was muttering a lot of things, but eventually, one thing caught Howard's attention: "That's a paradox. An Erskine paradox," she said, giggling to herself, proud of having coined something.

**~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~**  
 **AGE: NINE & 7/8**

Lt. Moretti opened the door for Bucky and an unwashed Maria, and on Bucky's order shut but didn't lock the door on them. Bucky took a position on the other side of the door, as Maria approached the prisoner's table in the middle of the room.

Not even the SSR uniform on her body, not the leaves in her hair or mud on her skin could disguise her heritage. Particularly not to this prisoner.

His jaw dropping slack, a silent mouthing that would have been an exclamation, Dr. Zola nearly leaps backwards out of his chair and as it is, he's standing up now.

 _Your reaction isn't to my having come here direct from doing the training course, again._ "You're hyperventilating," Maria observes, the way some people would casually remark upon the weather or an afternoon barrage.

"You..." Dr. Zola says. "You're alive."

"I noticed," she says, no trace of irony or sarcasm in her voice.

"I mean...they permitted you to live?" not sure what was going on.

"You knew my father and Dr. Erskine," Maria said, changing the subject.

Thinking she had given him the reason, Dr. Zola nodded. "I did."

"Dr. Erskine refused to assist my father in the development of the serum."

"Yes."

"Did anyone else receive the serum?"

"No."

"Never?"

"There was no wish to distribute it. Even before your father...used it upon himself," Dr. Zola said, choosing his words carefully. He had seen glimpses of what the Red Skull's reflexes had become, and had no desire to see if this red-faced cherub had inherited that as well. "None wished to subject German soldiers to a formula of uncertain result, and nor did anyone wish to 'super power' a person scheduled for death."

Maria frowned, thinking - and Dr. Zola shrank down into his chair. "But then what caught the attention of Hitler and the others?" Maria asked. _What brought Dr. Erskine into_ those _circles of authority?_

"Dr. Erskine had done great work, making vast strides in enhancement drugs, and his preferred method of delivery was intravenous liquids. Strong becomes herculean, fast becomes blinding, clever becomes brilliant."

_And from there, a short step to good becoming great, bad becoming worse._

"And then he discovered what he called the physical soul. He was beginning his work on that," Dr. Zola explained, "when he was summoned to Berlin."

_I understand what he meant in his notes where he says ‘the serum was not ready, but more importantly, the man was not ready.’ But does it hold meaning beyond the superficial? How would a ready serum react with an unready man? Or a ready man with an unready serum?_

**~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~**  
 **December 1991**

The casket had been carried, buried, spoken over. Memories had been shared by many of those who had known the deceased – today, Howard Stark – but one person remained silent and to one side. As the rain began to drizzle down on those present who left as soon as was respectfully possible after the end of the funeral, Maria remained where she had been.

“Who’re you?” Tony asked, walking right up to her, and his nose would’ve been right up against her black veil if either of them flinched – neither did.

“My condolences for your loss, Mr. Stark,” Maria said.

“I know who _I_ am. What I’m asking is who _you_ are.”

She said nothing; all the other SHIELD agents had by now melted away into the shadows, as they were supposed to.

“No uniform, so you’re not active military. All the veterans’ kids and grandkids are elsewhere, ditto for camp survivors, so my dad didn’t save your grand- or greatgranddad’s life. No camera or recording devices, so you’re not after a photo or a quote on how I’m dealing with this blow to my life. So I’ll ask again, Who – Are – You, lady?”

There was a time – had been a time – when she would have looked him in the eye and let him glimpse the fires burning there. _Scaring hell into or out of him. But I put aside childish things… Your father helped teach me to do that._ “I am paying my respects,” Maria said. “Your father deserved at least that much.”

“Shit, you’re not my illegitimate sister, are you? I figured you existed, dad being dad, but I wasn’t sure we’d ever meet.”

 _‘Sister.’ Not the most accurate word. But yet, closer than most._ “Keep safe, Tony Stark,” she said, turned, and walked away.

Tony stared, watching her leave.

**~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~**  
 **NOW**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'd finished writing the funeral scene...when it hit me what Tony's mom's name was. d'oh.


	5. Resolution

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steve apologizes....for, among other things, for not being there.
> 
> (tiny reference to The Dark Knight Rises)

**ON A GOTHAM ROOFTOP:**

Not moving towards or away, "I hear you were looking for me."

"I keep my ears open," Maria says, closing the door the accesses this rooftop behind her. "When I hear you were ready to be found, I came by. There's a difference."

"My mistake," Steve says, not moving from his position on the roof, looking out over Gotham. "I think I'm seeing the appeal."

"Have you met Batman?"

"Short guy. Bit of a chip on the shoulder."

"The replacement, then. Used to be tall with a very large chip." Maria was prepared to wait Steve out, to give as much time as he needed.

As a minute passed unremarked, Steve nodded, understanding what was going on. _I attacked her, then high-tailed it out of there. The ball is most assuredly in my court._ “I’m sorry for what I did at the test site, Maria. Agent Hill.”

“Done,” she said.

“That and what I’ve been thinking about these past – well, while I was gone – I put everything in place, everything that’s happened while I was asleep, everything that’s happened since. Just everything.”

“I’m not apologizing,” Agent Hill said.

“Not asking you to,” Steve said. “It’s me who owes _you_ an apology. I understand what it’s like to hate the Red Skull. But I never thought about what I’d do to put him out of commission. Never really had to – before I was frozen, I was going after him and taking down every installation he had, and taking in every soldier he used; after I was woken up, there was no way to get to him, or even to know if he was still alive.”

Maria nodded sagely. “That’s the worst part, the not knowing. If I had known, been absolutely positive that he was…I could have rested easy. I would have accepted imprisonment for life.”

 _A bit rash?_ “You did what you felt was needed, to make sure everyone was as ready as they could be. In case he did return.” Steve held up a hand to forestall anything she might have said in reply or response to that. “Since I woke up from the ice, I’ve either been prepping for the next battle, fighting that battle, or thinking about the people I lost to time.”

Maria nodded. _Understandable._

“You didn’t have that luxury, and as often as I wish to God that I’d had the time to spend with Peggy and our friends, I haven’t thought of the flip side of that coin – that I also didn’t have time to spend on post-War fighting HYDRA and everyone else. Didn’t have to worry about the transition from SSR to SHIELD. Didn't have to concern myself with whether and when He was going to return. I just walked in off the ice, and took my old job like nothing had happened.

“Except everything had happened.” Steve shook his head, running a hand briefly over his face. “Stark – Tony, anyway – tries to lighten it with jokes, calling me by nicknames he thinks don’t carry any weight. Everyone else either studiously avoids the matter entirely, changing the conversation to things that would’ve confused me back then too, or they just go silent when I’m around.” _Though for some Avengers and SHIELD agents, that silence could just as easily be their default._

She looked at him.

He turned away from looking at the skyline. “What would I have done in your shoes? Or rather, if I’d crashed, but never been frozen? How would I have passed the years? I would’ve done _something_ …can’t picture me just standing to one side while the world goes to war. Again. I don’t think I would have been as quiet as you, though.

“What would I have done? The night before I got the serum and changed, Dr. Erskine came by and told me about how, a little man knows the meaning and value of power, and is more respectful of it, and isn’t as likely to abuse it. Well, as a little guy, I don’t like bullies – and I have a feeling I would have continued my mission, even with the Red Skull dead and gone. Any bully, any where. Not like any weapons would be effective against me, right?” he said with a mild grin, one that washed away soon.

“Not based on current research,” Agent Hill said. “Recall the Hulkbuster affected me more.”

“And there weren’t any Hulks back then, no Other Guys or…” and shrugged. _Need to ask Stark what he meant when he said someone was going ‘dark side’ the other day. Maybe that’s what would have happened to me, unstoppable, always moving, taking out all the bullies…_

Thought Maria, _And the only person who could stop you, was a little red-skulled girl. Yay me._ Offering an olive branch when it seemed the Captain had fallen silent for longer than would be required to catch one’s breath or re-check wording, she rewarded Steve’s introspection with, "Bucky would read to me, most nights when he was stationed nearby and he wasn't on duty," Maria said. "I still have the phonographs of him reading me to sleep."

"I'd like to hear them," Steve said.

“I’ll drop them off, then,” she said. _Bucky never lived long enough for me to outgrow sitting on his lap, nor did he live long enough to see the human face I eventually grew. Some kids act out when they hit puberty, others rebel or run away; all I did was get hair and flesh-colored skin…which can retract away if I need it to. And I gained pupils and irises which don’t trigger terror in anyone._

“Bucky was a good man,” Steve said.

“Every day of his life,” Maria agreed. “He talked to me about many things, regardless of if he thought I could understand.” _And hero-worship was one of them._

_I told you once that you had been my hero. And there are ways that could have ended… I could have offered you myself…or I could make people who are more suitable and fitting equals for you. And it’s the latter which I’ve done. I knelt at the altar of you, which was set up by others, and I took it upon myself to give you companions to fight alongside, like how Gilgamesh got Enkindu._

Steve smiled. “Yeah, that sounds like him…he never was one to sugar-coat or dumb-down anything. He gave it to you like it was. And if you couldn’t handle it, that wasn’t his fault.” _But he’d help you come to terms with it, help you handle it…if you were his friend, and sometimes even complete strangers._

A small measure of companionable silence in shared memories, interrupted by a searchlight projecting an image into the skies. Steve tensed and was about to head down to see what was going on, but stopped when a hand was placed on his shoulder.

Agent Hill’s hand. Maria’s fingers. She advised him that “I don’t know about this one, but the last Batman was a bit territorial.”

“Okay,” Steve said. “But, while we’re up here…” and noted her raised eyebrows. "I thought of another option, in addition to the four or five we thought of back in that warehouse," Steve said. "We're both after the Red Skull, that's a given. I'll do everything I can to that end, back you up where you need it - though I doubt there's anything my words can do that yours can't, but still. I'm an Avenger, and I'm on your side, and that's it. Til we bring down your dad, that's all. Nothing more."

"And in return?" she asked.

"Two options, both of which are for only after the Red Skull's dead. You _don't_ die soon after. Ah- let me finish. Either way, you wait ten or two hundred years...we might want to ask Thor and company for some advice about how long is a good length after a death like that. At that point, If you still want to die, even a century or three after his death, fine, I'll be your second," _ready to be the killing stroke if you falter and so you don't suffer._

"And if I don't?" Maria asked.

"Again, whatever you want to do. By that point, SHIELD might be all we have in common. We go our separate ways, or not; up to you."

"And if you don't want to do what I do?"

"Like if you want to date, and I don't?" Steve asked.

"Sounds like something that might happen under some circumstance," recalling it.

"Well you can certainly wait me out, can't you?" he asked with a smile.

"I did once," she replied, matching that smile. _Tis a good plan,_ and told him so.

**Author's Note:**

> I have this vague memory that, in an earlier Captain America movie, the Red Skull has a daughter. But other than that one detail, this is just the canon of the Avengers and recent Captain America.
> 
> ,,,and try as I might, I can't think of what the other option would be.


End file.
